


A Pristine Name

by sirdust



Category: Helluva Boss (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Manipulative Relationship, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:40:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28619691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirdust/pseuds/sirdust
Summary: Stella and her husband entertain a pair of guests.-Rated T for mature themes and (only) a few swears.
Relationships: Stella Goetia & Stolas Goetia
Comments: 6
Kudos: 31





	A Pristine Name

**Author's Note:**

> full disclosure: i really like stella, but i like her because i think it would be super interesting if she was this sharply intelligent, self-righteous, and emotionally volatile antagonist with a mean streak for the history books, wrapped up in the grace and beauty of a high-society lady who is also a sick-as-fuck owl demon. don't give me a shrill obstacle, give me a woman who has been married to one of our major protagonists for at least 17 years and knows what weak spots to dig into the second he wrongs her. basically i will not rest until i have sold all of you on this interpretation as well.
> 
> content warning for manipulative behavior throughout and low-level physical abuse towards the end (nothing overtly violent, but a bit drawn-out and potentially upsetting).
> 
> i was too lazy to proofread/edit this btw.

Stella handed her tray to the servant and rested her hands on her lap. It was a relatively unspecial morning. She’d never been a fan of sudden excitement when it was happening to her, though it did make for a nice conversation with cousins.

Speaking of, she had scheduled tea with one of her cousins and his wife for the afternoon. It was a mixture of work and leisure time; her cousin was a duke. He and his consort presided over a few of the legions within Envy, and the responsibility most often fell on Stella to negotiate trade between their respective domains. She’d managed to convince her husband to handle things once or twice, but his head was mostly in the stars. Hardly trustworthy when it came to bookkeeping and economics, though she knew full well he was capable of doing the work. You didn’t acquire extensive knowledge of the cosmos without knowing at least a bit of math.

The morning stretched into the day and the time arrived along with the cousins. The duke was tall, pale, and angular, while his wife was short and plump with dark feathers sprouting from her head. Stella welcomed them into the estate and then the courtyard.

“How have you been?” she asked. A servant pulled out four chairs for the nobles to sit in. The duke took his seat in the final chair; the imp hadn’t finished pulling it all the way out quite yet and his hands were promptly squished against the metal.

“As well as can be expected,” he replied, a hint of laughter in his voice. His wife took the seat next to him.

“Not much trouble in our claim since we last spoke,” she added on, adjusting the hem of her dress and scooching closer to the table’s edge.

“Oh, you’re going to jinx it,” the duke remarked, leaning back comfortably. “We’re going to return and a quarter of the capital is going to be flooded.”

He looked at the servant, who was still nursing his bruised fingertips.

“Well?” he asked. An edge of irritation slid into his tone. “Where’s the tea? Are you going to stand around like that the whole evening?”

Just like that, the imp was off. Stella rolled her eyes at the way he scurried back into the mansion.

“May I ask where the prince is?” the consort asked, looking up at Stella, who remained standing.

She took a deep breath, picturing in her mind all manner of struggle that would ensue.

“I’ll be back in a moment,” she said, turning away. The fact that he wasn’t already outside was a bad sign, though not altogether unusual.

She called for him at first before heading upstairs. He’d hide away in the bedrooms when he was feeling especially drawn to projecting ‘moody child’ vibes, though Stella still held a sliver of hope that he’d come down without pouting too much.

She wandered the corridors, pushing open doors until she reached the master bedroom. She pressed an ear to the door and heard nothing inside, but there wasn’t anywhere else for him to hide, unless he had left, which he had never done before and wouldn’t do now. If he knew what was good for him. She had her doubts about that part.

The door creaked as it opened (Stella would need to have someone else fix that) and the room was dark. Stella squinted as her eyes adjusted to the low light.

“Are you in there?” she called. “You’re supposed to be downstairs with me entertaining the company.”

A face swiveled around, red eyes glowing through the dimness of the room. The sound of a book closing echoed against the high ceiling.

“That was _now?”_ her husband asked, voice fogged by confusion. “I must have lost track of the time.”

“You certainly did,” she said, leaning against the doorframe as her husband stood. He was in his day clothes, at least, though he hardly looked presentable as he reached for his hat. Better than half-naked, she supposed, though still not great. She’d told him not two hours earlier to get ready; the least he could do was fix the feathers around his face, or slick back that damned cowlick of his.

“Please, don’t feel like you have to attend on _my_ account,” she said, venom dripping into her voice. “I’d hate for you to get bored and half-ass some excuse midway through so you can leave. If you think you have more important things to--”

“No, no,” her husband protested, hooking his cape across his shoulders. “I’ll stay the whole time.” He smiled. “If not, you have my full permission to scold me for it later.”

Stella was unmoved. “Hardly a time for compromises. You know I’m sick of this.”

Her husband’s mouth straightened into an awkward line.

“I’ll let it go this time, but if you keep avoiding something this simple, don’t even bother making excuses next time. I can handle it myself.” It was true. If anything, he made proceedings all the more tedious: the dialogue all the stranger, the atmosphere all the more uncomfortable.

“You’re lucky you have a seat at your own table at this point,” she remarked.

He sighed.

“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry, Stella. I appreciate your patience.”

She smirked at that.

“You’re just lucky I’m so forgiving,” she said, shifting into a more playful stance. She grabbed her husband’s arm to lead him by the wrist. “And remember. In front of guests, it’s ‘dear’.”

“Must I?” he said as they began their descent. His brow was furrowed but his smile was returning.

“If you don’t, I fear my frustration shall return with a vengeance.” She glanced back at him, a twinge of amusement in her expression. “‘Darling’.”

Her husband was greeted enthusiastically at the table. That was nothing new; things always started out fine, but she had to be vigilant nonetheless. Hellos were the easy part, but a smooth journey to the goodbyes was another matter entirely.

“Thank you again for having us, your highness,” the consort said at one point, as if Stella had not been the one to invite them and as if Stella was not the one to retrieve him from whatever trivial distraction he’d been absorbed into an hour prior. Sure, she’d married in, but she was fairly certain that she was the only reason the estate hadn’t fallen into shambles at this point. In what world was a man who hardly managed to get out of bed some days due that sort of credit?

“Oh.” Her husband blinked, disturbed from his current bout of playing with the folds of his napkin like a toddler. “Thank you for coming. It’s always a pleasure.”

“Yes.” Stella sipped her tea. Bitter. “My husband is notorious for his love of business.”

The duke laughed at that and his wife followed along uncertainly. Stella’s husband forced a chuckle that sounded more like a cough, but kept his mouth shut.

“Oh, don’t be so dour, your highness!” the duke said to him. “None of us enjoy this work. It’s not as if we expected to trade bureaucracy for bureaucracy when we joined the war.” He poured himself more tea. “The benefits are quite nice, though, I have to say.”

Stella’s husband nodded. “Yes. I’d say I’m lucky to have my astronomy, too.” He traced the shape of a cupless saucer left on the table. “Recently, I had the pleasure of observing a--”

“What my _dearest_ husband means to say,” Stella interrupted, determined to keep him from derailing the conversation into something none of them could relate to, “is that he’s glad we can all connect over our shared work, despite other differences we may possess.”

“Well said.” The consort raised her cup to her and Stella smiled at the gesture. “I’m glad he has something he enjoys, but for the life of me, I can’t understand that astro-mumbo-jumbo.”

Stella gave her husband a look.

_See?_

His face pinkened and he looked down at his own teacup, nodding slightly. It was short-lived. He perked up again a few minutes later, ready to attempt yet another change of topic.

“You two don’t have any children, as I recall?” he asked. “Unless there’s some news I haven’t heard yet.” He winked. Stella’s gut churned with disgust.

The consort looked at her duke and shook her head. “No, we don’t.”

“Shame.” Stella’s husband took a sip of his tea. “Every day is an adventure when you have a child. Just the other day, my daughter--”

Stella’s face hardened.

“ _Our_ daughter,” she nearly hissed. Her husband barely missed a beat, grimacing for only a moment before speaking up again.

“--thank you. Dear. Our daughter, Octavia, made the most fascinating observation. I was showing her one of my charts, and she pointed out an error I had made in calculating the motion of 1843 I over the next four-hundred years. The comet passes by some bodies with gravity levels that fluctuate significantly in a rather short time span, so its path varies to an extent every time it makes its way around. It’s not unique in that sense, but it can be quite difficult to make precise predictions as to where it will be when the window of observation is so small in so many places. I’m beginning to suspect she’s smarter than I am.”

_No shit._

The consort yawned. Stella’s fingers twitched.

“Well, with all due respect, your highness, I don’t see the problem there,” the duke remarked. “We never see you for very long either, but we can always guess what you’re going to say next.”

He cackled at his own joke and Stella’s husband shrugged.

“I admit to it,” he replied, grin weak. “I am nothing if not passionate.”

Stella would have fervently contested that in private, but it didn’t seem like an appropriate discussion to have at the table.

“Glad to hear our heir is mathematically proficient, but how do you mess something like that up when you have a window into outer space itself?” she asked.

That sounded accusatory. She plastered a fake smile across her beak to soften the question.

“It’s not exactly something you can _see,_ S--dear,” he said, scratching his cheek as if he’d been caught off guard. “Besides, I’d have to get microscopically close. I don’t want to singe my feathers.”

Stella struggled to keep her smile from morphing into a grimace as her cousins burst into peals of laughter. The duke wiped a tear from his eye.

“Didn’t know one of the most tactically daring commanders in Lucifer’s army had become such a fop,” he said, wonton giggles still escaping his maw. “I don’t mean to be rude, but color me shocked that you’re the one in the pants and her highness is the one in skirts.” He nodded towards Stella.

Irritation splashed across her husband’s face like a blotch of paint spilled from the bucket, but it was couldn’t have been even a fraction of the anger Stella was feeling right now.

“Even if that little joke of yours wasn’t meaningless, _your grace_ , it’d still be awfully dry.” His eyes were laser-focused on the duke. For a moment, the visual of her cousin being turned to stone flashed across her mind’s eye, and she shifted to get up before stopping herself. Her husband wasn’t enough of an idiot to cause such a commotion, even if his favorite habit did happen to be embarrassing himself and his wife.

“Did you pick that one up from the scum in Pride?” he continued. “I didn’t know you had such a fondness for low-brow mud-slinging. My wife and I are equals.”

He was digging them both in deeper. Stella wished he would keep her name--her _title_ \--out of his running mouth.

The duke was visibly taken aback, but he relaxed just as quickly. “I apologize for any offense,” he grinned. “Sincerely. Looks like you’ve still got some fight in you left, eh?”

He and his wife erupted into another fit of giggles, too lost in amusing themselves at her husband’s expense to see the scowl curling onto Stella’s face. She looked at her husband. He sat awkwardly, unsure how to react.

Stella grabbed his wrist. He looked at her like he was lost and how _dare_ he wear that expression, as if he wasn’t directly responsible for the position the two found themselves in now, as if he hadn’t created yet another drop of resentment that could expand into a sea of hate if Stella didn’t clean up his mess. As goddamn usual.

She squeezed her claws into the firm skin until she felt it weaken and pinched hard.

Her husband’s eyes widened, but he didn’t pull away immediately. “Stop.”

It didn’t sound like a command and Stella only glared.

“ _Don’t,”_ she said, pinching down harder.

He finally yanked his arm out of her grip, holding his tender wrist in his other hand, a hurt look spread across his features. The guests were still laughing, unaware. “Why did you do that?”

Stella glanced at her cousins. “Do what?”

His posture grew indignant. “That hurt.”

It was an inarticulate and unbecoming thing to say. Stella picked up her bitter tea and finished the cup.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

He was quiet for the rest of the meeting, which passed by without incident.

Neither of them brought it up that night, or any of the nights after.

**Author's Note:**

> fun fact: this fic got way longer than i was anticipating. i was not expecting it to break more than 500 words when i was turning it over in my mind cavity, but that's just how it goes sometimes.
> 
> i hope you enjoyed, or at least found it interesting. thanks for reading.


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